#i won't even begin to comment on the comments that don't want 'gay' romance and want jeokyeon to be a woman

[seoafin]

like obviously jeokyeon's complex relationship with his gender and the fact that he had to essentially become a boy/man to compete in the games lends itself to the narrative because he understands what it means to be a woman and has empathy for marginalized groups (women, biseol as a ghoul, etc) but the handling of other women in the manhwa is....abysmal. women are only given as much as depth as they pertain to other male characters. yes women are strong, independent (and often abused by men) but we don't actually see the few female characters in the manhwa outside of their role in society as a mother wife virgin spurned abused lover or prostitute before jeokyeon is saving them. we were briefly there when we were introduced to doha's mother who was a strong woman in her own right but then she's killed off anyway! for being the emperor's wife. it's just......hmmm.....i feel like the author focuses way too much on jeokyeon's harem of men and their obsession with him than like....plot. jeokyeon is comfortable as a man! he's been living as a man for the last hundred of years! except biseol still often refers to him as a woman at times (especially when he's thinking about his sexual and romantic urges for him), or the girl she used to be. it's like oh here's a character that hid their gender and even mutilated himself to be perceived as a man and is now comfortable living as a man and being perceived as one but the second sexual and romantic urges come into play the narrative decides he's a woman again. i feel like we could have really interesting commentary on the treatment of women and jeokyeon's loss of autonomy both in terms of becoming a man because he had nothing else and how romance and the love of his love interests force heteronormative gender dynamics upon him once again. the SAME THING he was trying to escape by becoming a MAN.

[wei--wuxian]

not reblogging the actual post because i don't want to 1. get into an argument or 2. detract from the point the op was making about aro/acespec queer representation in media. but like.

the post mentioned as a throwaway backup to their point that "there's evidence in various countries that less than half of gay people are in committed relationships" and are more likely to be single or have casual sex.

and like ok i'll take the casual sex point. but i will not take the "gay people are less likely to be in relationships/more likely to be single" point.

why the fuck do you think that is?

gee i wonder why an oppressed minority who are less likely to even be ALLOWED to socialise with potential partners or know how to FIND potential partners or be SAFE enough to explore the romantic side of social interactions might not be as likely as straight people to be in relationships?

growing up queer is intensely lonely. being a queer adult is intensely lonely ESPECIALLY a young adult just beginning to find your own way. it takes WORK to meet other people like you. all the usual places straight people start their romances are incredibly unlikely to hold any potential at all for you. or if they do you won't know about it. or if you know about it you might be punished for it.

it's getting better now. maybe op of that post lives somewhere accepting, grew up with queer friends, saw their romantically inclined peers get the chance to explore the romance they wanted. maybe that's why they made such a shortsighted fucking comment.

but it's not like that for all of us.

it's that old "ice cream leads to drowning" point again -- correlation is not causation. there is something big standing right next to this fact that you are not looking at.

anyway i don't exactly have a point i just got pissed off and wanted to yell about it. i spent so much of my life lonely and for someone to act like this was a choice and "queers just prefer to be single" is a slap in the face to me at 13-14-15-19-20 who just wanted the chance to kiss someone who didn't think i was a straight girl.

[eldritch-spouse]

I have a feeling this was asked before, but how would Breg handle an asexual/aromantic S/O? Like, they are not sex repulsed, just... really not horny, ever.

[Divine comedy at its finest, creepy horndog falls in love with least horny person on the planet...]

(Minors dni)

Breg with an asexual/aromantic obsession

Quite unfortunate, really. Especially because Breg has no idea what those terms mean or that people with no interest in sex or romance even exist. He's been learning a lot of terminology, he finally understands what words like "gay" and "bi" and whatnot refer to, but those two you just mentioned? Doesn't have a clue. If you told him what an asexual was, Breg would probably laugh and tell you that was a very funny joke- And then promptly get a slap across the face. Quite deserved;

Once again, a conversation needs to happen here. And it will take quite some time before Breg grasps that asexuality is real and valid- Not because he's a dick about it, it's just that he doesn't know anything other than hypersexuality. It's mind-boggling for him to think that you sincerely don't have any sort of sexual impulse. Or at least not a significant one. This will make Breg feel extremely out of place, as he is the complete opposite of you in that regard. All his fantasies hit the drain as he realizes that this exacerbated part of his nature will only serve to drive you two apart, and Breg cannot stand the thought. Sexually active or not, Breg loves you, you're the perfect mate! The breeder will do anything to appease you, even if it means nullifying his own desires and needs;

First, I think Breg would try to hide his cravings from you. He'd avoid sexual topics or comments and generally be very chaste, but you can probably tell he's uncomfortable or holding himself back. Really, you will have to be the one to set boundaries here and directly tell the monster what he can and can't do. As a result of you never really wanting sex and Breg feeling like a huge inconvenience, the breeder will probably resort to getting himself off behind your back, and more frequently than usual too, since he's constantly around the object of his desires but can't really do anything about it (or so he assumes). He's going to die of shame if you ever catch him in the middle of this, and generally begin to resent his own sexuality. Why can't he be more like you? You'd love him more if he wasn't so needy, right? This type of unhealthy thought might culminate in Breg seriously considering castrating himself. You heard me right, the breeder would castrate himself for you. Which is amazing when you consider that breeders are very scared of sexual dysfunction. Please sit this idiot down again and tell him to not maim himself;

If you're willing to have sex for Breg's sake alone, then I think he would genuinely burst with adoration for you. Putting yourself through something so intimate that doesn't interest you at all just for him is a huge display of trust and love and Breg will always do his best to repay you for the attention. Perhaps the good part about doing this is that you don't have to be very involved if you don't want to. Breg can get off just fine as long as you're part of it, somehow;

Breg's view on aromantic people is already not as pleasant. What do you mean you don't want romantic relationships? Are you actually serious? Can't grasp it, he just can't. The monster refuses to accept it. He won't settle for being your friend. He needs to be your lover, he needs to be in a relationship with you even if you're incapable of loving him back- Which he refuses to acknowledge. You love him, of course you do. I'm going to be honest here, Breg will enter complete delusion and constantly invalidate this part of you. He feels like your attitude is the result of emotional harm done to you rather than a natural disposition. He wants to "fix you". And that won't end well. If you deny his romantic advances Breg will resort to sex to prove his love for you in a way that you may accept. If you're both asexual and aromantic, I'm sorry to say but you're shit out of luck with Breg. He will never force sex but he will force romance;

For asexuals, Breg probably works on restraining himself when his heat is starting, preferably someplace away from you. There's no telling this will actually work out well though.

[gillianthecat]

So, I started watching The Devil Judge knowing almost nothing about the plot. I may have looked at the MyDramaList summary but if so it was too vague to leave an impression. I'm in the middle of episode 5 now, and here are some ramblings on what I think the story is and where I predict it's going:

(If anyone reading this knows how the story develops, please don't spoil me before I finish it! I'll make a note here once I'm done if anyone wants to comment after that. Thank you!)

Update: Finished it! Spoil away!

Also, this will include spoilers up through episode 5, and probably won't make much sense if you haven't watched it.

Early on, I did google "devil judge BL" because the glimpses I'd seen on tumblr gave me the impression it was somewhere on the scale between unintentionally homoerotic and censored bromance. This brought me to absolutebl's review, which I skimmed through very quickly to avoid spoiling myself, but left me with the sense that the leads never kiss or get together but are overtly shown as having a romantic relationship and/or sexual tension. That it was not a BL but that it was gay. (This might not be what absolutebl actually wrote!-I was actively trying to not process most of the words I saw.)

This is all to say that I've gone into The Devil Judge without knowing even what genre(s) it is, which has made watching an interesting experience of trying to figure out what's going on. On top of that, I have only watched a few other pieces of Korean media, and nothing like this, so I'm sure I'm missing connections and interpretations that would be obvious to Korean viewers and others more familiar with Korean storytelling conventions, and adding on my own interpretations that aren't there.

But! I'm on episode five and I think I finally figured out what the story is! I think it's three stories, actually: a gothic romance, a revenge tale and a detective story. To my American eyes, I see shades of two European classics - Jane Eyre and The Count of Monte Cristo. These two stories are kind of nestled along side each other, taking turns. Ga-on and Yo-han are in the gothic romance together, while Yo-han is in the revenge tale. And both these stories are framed by an overarching detective story with Ga-on as the protagonist.

(I'm still not sure which of these is the "main" genre. Will one of them take precedent? Or will they continue to have equal weight through the end? And will that work as a story if there isn't one single framework for it? I don't know enough about storytelling to predict that.)

I think it took me a while to figure out because early on it felt like it was going somewhere different. There were a few contradictory threads. (Looking back now I do think the mystery of "what genre even is this?" is intentional. Part of the fun of this show is the layers and layers of mysteries.)

At the beginning, the story is introduced as a detective tale, with Kim Ga-on being asked by his mentor to solve the mystery of Kang Yo-han's secrets. But there was so much else happening it never felt to me like "detective story" was going to be the true genre we were in. The stuff about televised trials made me expect something like The Hunger Games. All the political intrigue and secondary characters made it feel like an ensemble political thriller.

But the main vibe I was getting was "corruption of innocence." The title The Devil Judge and the framing of Yo-han as mysterious and incredibly powerful made me expect a corruption thriller. This version would be Ga-on's story and Yo-han would remain mysterious and opaque through the end. It's the story of the innocent ingenue who is seduced by the sexy devil but tries to fight his attraction and the narrative forces pushing him into the devil's arms. (This is what I imagine the story of Hannibal to be, although I've never watched Hannibal, so this might be inaccurate.) Ga-on's investigation of Yo-han's mysterious past, all the political intrigue, all the drama around the trials, all of this would be the ways in which the devil judge drags Ga-on down with him.

But then the show began doing things I that didn't fit that storyline. It kept giving us, the audience, insights into Yo-han as a person. The first time was an interaction with Elijah, where he's grumpy and pouty and more human than we'd seen him yet. At first I dismissed it a little bit of softening of Yo-han's image to make the seduction more plausible. But then the show started revealing some of the mysteries about Yo-han. And we started getting flashbacks from his perspective, and started seeing his mask slip while he was in private. Oh! I thought, he's becoming a character with his own arc in this story.

The moment when I realized this was a gothic romance was mid episode 5 when GaOn is playing with Elijah on the sunny lawn and YoHan is in the dark house, in his expensive dressing gown, peering through the curtains staring at him. Ga-on leans back on his arms in what is frankly a flirtatious pose, and their eyes meet.

Ah! I thought, I've seen this scene before! This is every historical romance novel where the wide-eyed ingenue is forced by circumstances to live with the bitter duke in his cold dark mansion. The ingenue melts the duke heart, the duke gives the ingenue a sexual awaking, and they fall in love. That's it! Everything we've seen so far of Ga-on and Yo-han fit into this story.

The gothic romance framing is most apparent when we're at Yo-han's house. Common romance plot beats and tropes include: The ingenue slowly wins over the child, the cat and the housekeeper! She does kind things (Ga-on's cooking!) to make the duke's life brighter. She's distrustful of him at first but slowly starts seeing his vulnerable side. He slowly starts to melt from her innate goodness. Like, they are literally that! Yo-han even dresses Ga-on to take him to a ball! They encounter each other in their night clothes and half-naked! Ya-hon looks slutty in his dressing gown! He forbids Ga-on from exploring the mansion! Ga-on does it anyways, but what he finds ends up making him sympathize with Ya-hon! Ga-on wakes Yo-han from a nightmare! Yo-han tends Ga-on's injuries! Sorry, that's a lot of exclamation points; I got excited about how well it mapped.

Outside the mansion, the romance framing is not as obvious. I think its set up deliberately ambiguously, to imply the possibility several potential stories. But looking back, all of Ga-on and Yo-han's relationship fits a gothic romance plot.

Ga-on is presented as a purely good person in a corrupt world, a little naïve, but also brave and clever. His ingenue-ness is emphasized in the contrast with the calculating cynicism of the other judge (this is not a criticism of her, I think she's a great and complex character!).

Ga-on is set up from the beginning to be intimidated and intrigued by Yo-han, just like Jane Eyre is with Mr. Rochester. All of their interactions are filmed and edited in way that builds tension, tension that reads to me as sexual. Yo-han is shown as fascinated by Ga-on in return. At the charity event, he is possessive and proprietary over Ga-on, steering him around with a hand on his back, showing him off to the guests, than claiming him back.

All of this could be interpreted as part of a corruption thriller - that's a storyline that also features a wide-eyed ingenue. But when combined with what we're learning about Yo-han, it feels very gothic romance to me. Even the way that Yo-han manipulates Ga-on, which most strongly gives the impression of a corruption arc, also fits into the romance.

If Go-han and Yo-han's story is a romance, than Yo-han must be a human being with his own character arc, which in turn implies an answer to the opening mystery of the show - is he a sociopathic predator or is he on quest for justifiable revenge? For the romance to make sense, it has to be the latter.

Even through episode five, the show is still teasing us with contradictory evidence about the truth of Yo-han's character. Is he a sociopath who likes to hunt people for fun? They show us Crime and Punishment in that childhood bedroom. They give scant context to his night time attacks in the black hoodie. He seems pretty deranged during the car chase with the minister's son. Elijah and the housekeeper both say they don't trust him and blame him for stealing the house. After Yo-han tells Ga-on his tragic story of the fire at the cathedral, we the audience see him laugh and say something like "everyone loves a sob story."

But I think we're starting to receive evidence that the true interpretation is that Yo-han is on a quest of justifiable revenge. In many of Yo-han's flashbacks, there's no reason for it to be a lie. He's not telling the story to anyone else, he's alone with his memories of being beaten as a child, or of setting aside his feelings to be the "perfect" judge, implying that's part of his revenge plot. None of these memories specifically answer the central mystery of what happened in the cathedral fire, but they do make him human and sympathetic. Combined with his framing as a romance character, its enough to make me believe that "righteous avenger" is the truth and "evil sociopath" is the obfuscation.

This means that the second story of the series is Yo-han's tale of a painstakingly planned and long awaited revenge. I don't know if its intentional, but I'm seeing lots of shades of The Count of Monte Cristo in this, where Yo-han has disguised his true self for a decade and put an elaborate plot in motion to take down his betrayers one-by one.

The question I'm asking at this point is how this is going to interact with the romance plotline. My prediction is that Ga-on is going to be pulled into Ya-hon's vengeance quest, which I suppose would be a version of the corruption plot, which would mean that my initial impression of the show was partly correct.

The other options would be for Ga-on to be sidelined during the revenge quest, which just seems boring and therefore unlikely. Or for Ga-on to gentle Yo-hon into giving up on vengeance, which seems even more boring and not where all the dramatics are leading us.

Oh! I suspect the merging of these two plots will turn out to be based in the resolution of the framing detective plot, which asks the question: "is Judge Kang good or evil?" My prediction is that this is a mystery not just for Ga-on and the audience, but also for Yo-hon himself!

It's not just the narrative that teases the audience with contradictory information -- even Yo-han himself is teasing Ga-on, sometimes presenting himself as a predator, sometimes a victim. For the audience, this is part of the original mystery. But for Ga-on and Yo-han, I think this is actually part of the romance plot. On a superficial level, I think the teasing is way that Yo-han flirts with Ga-on. But I think a major thread starting to emerge is Yo-han's conception of himself, and I predict that thread will be part of the romance plotline.

Given what the priest said about him, along with the flashbacks of his father, I think that as a child Yo-han was vilified and always seen as an outsider. Now, I don't know how much of the priest's flashback was accurate - was he really stirring up chaos in the classroom or was the priest's version a lie? But either way, I predict we're going to be shown a Yo-han whose childhood misdeeds were understandable and justifiable, but who internalized a view of himself as a bad person. He then shed all his vulnerabilities and kindness in order to turn himself into a tool for vengeance. In seeking revenge, he has hurt and possibly killed a lot of people, and he has to view himself as callous and uncaring in order to do that. I don't think he actually is a sociopath, but I think at this point he probably sees himself as one.

Yo-han has been on this revenge quest for so long that he's lost the sense of who he is outside of it. He's presenting two different version of himself to two different groups of people. To the general public he's the kind and wise judge, beloved by all. But for some reason, (and I don't yet know how it fits his plan) he's decided to let his enemies perceive him as a sociopathic predator in disguise. And since he knows that the "benevolent hero" is not real, he's come to believe that the sociopath is the real him.

This is part of the romance plot because I'm predicting that Ga-on will help Yo-han come back to his true self, remember the parts of himself that aren't about vengeance, and find healing from tragic childhood of being abused and misunderstood. This is a common plot point in gothic romance.

I could be way off base here, but this would actually make a lot of sense on a narrative level. It would also imply that the main genre of the story is romance, and the detective story and the revenge story are serving the romance. I'm a much bigger reader of romance, so this could be my biases in interpretation, but I do think it would work!

However, I don't think this is actually a romance genre story despite the strong romance arc. This is mostly because I read that they don't end up together, which is a requirement for genre romance. That means I have no idea how its going to ultimately end. Is it going to be a tragedy? Ambiguous? Confusing because they switch genres at the end? The only "happy ending" I can imagine to all the mess and drama is Ga-on and Yo-han together as each others' refuge in the chaos and cruelty of the world, but I already know that doesn't happen. Unless they do end up together but the story tries to tell us its a friendship or similar obvious nonsense.

I still do predict that Ya-hon and Ga-on are collectively going to continue the vengeance quest, and I don't think that contradicts Ya-hon starting to see himself as a good person. I think there are a couple ways this could go.

It could end on a tragic note, with the quest completed but Ya-hon feeling hollow and that victory doesn't give him the relief and freedom he was seeking. And perhaps Ga-on feeling disgusted with himself for being seduced by evil. So basically Ga-on is following the corruption arc and Ya-hon is following the romance arc but is saved too late.

It could be that they continue the quest but stop before its completed because Ga-on helps Ya-hon realize that's not who he wants to be. Basically, Ya-hon choses Ga-on over vengeance. That would be the most "romance genre" of endings, but since I don't think this is actually a romance genre story its probably not where the story will go.

I suppose they could lose and the "bad guys" could win. I don't know what this would do to Yo-han and Ga-on's relationship. Or it could be another ending I can't imagine now, but I'm excited to see what happens!

Ok, I've written all these words, and its only focused on Ga-on an Yo-han! I do have many thoughts and predictions about the other characters, themes and plotlines, but haven't organized them into coherence yet. Perhaps I'll post more later.  Edit: It’s a mess, but here they are!

[sirendeepity]

Books I've read in 2021

Because why not + comments

36/21 (updated to: /30)

The Cruel Prince ★★★★ (I read this just a year ago? Damn, a reread is definitely needed)

The Lost Sisters ★★★ (Still trying to understand the point of this)

The Wicked King ★★★★ (That time I understood TikTok fed me lies about the romance in this series)

The Queen of Nothing ★★★★ (I didn't understand a thing back then and I still don't do it now)

How the King of Elfhame Learned to Hate Stories ★★★★ (Cardan. Thank you for coming to my TedTalk)

A Court of Silver Flames ★★★★★ (Rating based on the main characters and the headcanons, not the plot because I can't rate what doesn't exist)

Six of Crows ★★★★ (Do I really need to elaborate?)

Shadow and Bone ★★★ (I still can't remember how the book actually ended because I watched the tv adaptation before finishing it so now I have no idea which is which. And btw Archie Renaux thank you for existing, my life and Mal's is better because of you <3 )

Realm Breaker ★★★.5 (Why the 15 pages per chapter, V? Just tell me why. Sorasa Sarn made up pretty well for it, bUT STILL-)

Kingdom of the Wicked ★★★★★ (We could've been so good together)

The Atlas Six ★★★★ (Flexing hard having read this before it became TikTok famous, but flexing harder having Olivie Blake commenting on my live-reading thread)

Red, White & Royal Blue ★★★★ (I wanted the gays and this gave me the gays, that's all I have to say)

The Sea of Monsters ★★★ (How it started kind of, I read the first one in summer 2020)

The Titan's Curse ★★★

The Battle of the Labyrinth ★★★★

The Last Olympian ★★★★★ (How it ended, and it hit harder than I expected)

These Violent Delight ★★★★★ (tHE LOVE THE PAIn)

The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo ★★★★ (No fruit love felt in here, but that ending? Can we talk about it? A full star more just for that)

Gild ★★★.5 (It's the journey trope for me)

Kingdom of the Cursed ★★★★ (The ending saved a lot but Kerri? What happened? I was confused, but you were confused even more than me apparently)

Crescent City: House of Earth and Blood ★★★★★ (Go kiss Bryce Quinlan's ass. Now. Also can I just flex the fact and Bryce and I share the same middle name? I MEAN that's queen material, I won't be embarrassed by it ever again)

To Kill A Kingdom ★★★★ (Started in May; it's definitely the journey trope for me)

The Shadow Between Us ★★ (Slytherin romance mY ASS)

The Raven Boys ★★★★★ (THIS BOOK GODDAMNIT I still dream of it at night)

Dream Thieves ★★★★ (Umh... Kerah?)

Blue Lily, Lily Blue ★★★★.5 (The Beginnings, if you know what I mean)

The Raven King ★★★★★ (Fucked up my brain real bad ngl)

Opal ★★★ (Basically useless but the few Pynch scenes were just *chef's kiss*)

Call Down the Hawk ★★★ (I didn't read TRC in a week only to waste a full month on this damn book)

Our Violent Ends ★★★★★ (it was a one-way ticket to (S)pain, no refund)

Mister Impossible ★★★ (I wish I could hate this book but I don't but I hate that I can't love it either I'm like aocjsox)

The math doesn't add up because I also read three boring books for school and the first two manga volumes of My Hero Academia, hopefully one day I'll catch up with the rest as well or I'll just buy all the volumes and start from where the anime ended